Vodafone cuts EU roaming charges (Image: GETTY • VODAFONE)
Vodafone customers traveling to Europe will soon face shocking new charges for using their smartphones. The UK network has just revealed that it is following EE with the reintroduction of these controversial charges that could add as much as £56 to a family’s monthly mobile bill.
Vodafone has confirmed that the new rates will take effect from January and will apply to anyone who purchases a smartphone subscription or SIM card from the company after August 11.
That means that as long as customers stick to their current plan – or upgrade within a few days – they won’t be charged the new EU roaming charges.
The network says it is making the changes to give people more choice about what they pay for.
“The majority of our customers are not ordinary roamers,” said Ahmed Essam, Vodafone CEO. “Indeed, less than half of our customers roamed outside the Republic of Ireland in 2019. And the reality is that including roaming – a service that costs us money to deliver – in any subscription means that more than half of our customers pays for something they don’t use. What is free to one person usually has to be paid for by another.”
Anyone affected by the fee will see £2 per day added to their bill when using their devices in places such as Greece, Spain, Italy, Portugal and Germany.
In addition to customers who do not change plans after August 11, some Xtra subscription contracts will also become available that provide access to 83 worldwide destinations. This means that customers who register do not have to pay extra for the use of their device abroad.
Vodafone has also confirmed that it will offer eight and fifteen day passes, which can be purchased in advance and cost £1 per day instead of the standard £2.
Vodafone isn’t the only network to make changes to its roaming plans, of course, with EE also charging £2 per day from January 2022 for using devices in Europe. Again, this price change will affect all new customers and those who upgrade their current deal – customers who stick to their current deal will not be affected by the new fee.
Finally, anyone with an O2 SIM in their phone is now restricted by a fair use policy meaning they can’t use more than 25GB of data while outside of the UK.
As long as the user stays within that limit, there’s nothing to pay other than watching movies at the end of your two week break in a row and it can get expensive.
That’s because then £3.50 per additional 1GB is added to the bills – as an example of how much this could cost, a Full HD movie is about 4GB in size, so a night for a movie costs £14.
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